


Winterfest

by Severina



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Community: lands_of_magic, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-26
Updated: 2014-12-26
Packaged: 2018-03-03 16:36:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2857649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Severina/pseuds/Severina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Belle brings one of the traditions from her home to the Dark Castle. Rumplestiltskin is strangely -- to him, at least -- accommodating.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Winterfest

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sanalith](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sanalith/gifts).



> Written for sanalith at LJ's lands_of_magic Secret Santa exchange.
> 
> * * *

His little caretaker is humming again.

She flits about the great room, straightening objects that don't need straightening, brushing her cleaning rag over a table that is already gleaming. And always humming, sometimes slipping a few words of the tune into the mix. The caterwauling only stops when she ducks behind the curtains to press her palms to the frosty glass, and then he hears her sigh. Rumplestiltskin cocks his head, regards the shape of her figure behind the thick brocade. He can too easily imagine the downturn of her lips, the crease in her forehead as she gazes pensively at the outside world, and his fingers stutter on the wheel. Perhaps she only wishes that he would let her walk the grounds of the castle, though why she would want to spend the afternoon dodging ice pellets and freezing drizzle he cannot begin to imagine. He almost wishes she would ask him though, for today he might even allow it – if only to end her constant twittering.

Yes, he would grant her wish only to get her out of his hair and to allow him to spin in peace. No other reason than that.

Then she pushes the curtains aside and he bends his head to his task as she launches into another circuit of the room with her duster, and the singing begins anew.

It ought to disturb him, but instead he finds himself accommodating the spin of the wheel to the cadence of her voice, tilting his head whenever she fails to hit a particularly high note. And _that_ ought to bring a barb to his lips about her off-key warbling, something to make her purse her lips and flee to the sanctuary of her library and leave him to the silence and his thoughts, but he finds the corners of his lips quirking and he quickly ducks his head, turns his attention to the straw. He will not look at her. He will not.

Rumplestiltskin manages to hold onto this resolve for a full three minutes.

His eyes flick to hers just as she's gazing upon him, a soft smile on her lips, and surely that must be a coincidence, simply a small twist of fate that caused him to raise his eyes just as hers were flitting past him to take in something else in the room. The motion of his head merely made her stop, hesitate. There is nothing pleasing in his countenance to cause her to pause, to stop and stare at him with that look of contentment. Unlike her, with her long chestnut curls that make one's fingers twitch in their eagerness to touch and pet, or soft full lips that promise warmth and welcome, or a dress that hugs her curves and flits prettily above her ankles as she walks. A dress that he most certainly did not conjure to match the hue of her eyes.

Belle's lips curl just a touch now. She must be thinking of her lost love, her broad-shouldered Gaston, and the thought makes something curdle in his stomach. He palms the wheel to a sharp stop, glares at her across the room. "What?" he snaps.

For a moment her smile only broadens, and he scowls; briefly ponders whether she had noticed that he was spinning in time to her little tune. But of course that's ridiculous. There is no reason for her to be paying him any attention at all. Hadn't he just decided that she was lost in remembrance of her square-jawed fiancé? 

"Tea in twenty minutes," she reminds him.

"Yes, yes," he answers. He lifts a hand to wave her away, off to her pots and pans. "Perhaps you can endeavor not to burn our dinner tonight, hmmm?"

He can see that she barely stops herself from rolling her eyes at him, but he lets the impertinence pass. He means to return immediately to his spinning, but finds himself watching her as she strides purposefully from the room, listening to the click of her heels fade as she disappears into the bowels of the castle. 

Finally he can enjoy some peace. He takes up his straw again, but his hands are clumsy and before too long he finds his lap littered with chaff.

It's too quiet.

* * *

The tea tray barely rattles when Belle enters the room, but it's enough to send Rumplestiltskin bounding from his stool to take his place at the table. He's merely hungry, that's all. He does not seek her company.

He does not.

He takes his seat and steeples his fingers at his waist while she arranges the items from the tray. A bowl of winter roses in the centre of the table; fresh bread and pats of butter in a basket to his left, and some odd little nut pastries arranged on a platter next to the bread. It is more of a feast than she's ever attempted and he raises a brow, but she's concentrating on displaying the pastries just so and then pouring the tea, and she doesn't lift her gaze to him at all. 

Lastly she places a bowl in front of him and a spoon to its right, and he waits a moment before lifting the spoon to trail it tentatively through the sludge. "I've warned you not to go into my turret room, dearie," he titters. "You've gotten into the dragon's spleen again, haven't you?"

Belle merely laughs at him. "It's stew," she says, "and it's perfectly edible. I already had some myself."

He almost mentions that the last time he took her word for that he spent the evening hastily concocting a potion to counteract the ill-effects of her so-called 'stew', but she's leaning forward to watch him now, the look on her face eager and expectant, so he skeptically raises the spoon to his mouth and takes a tiny swallow.

It tastes more like tepid dishwater than stew, but his stomach doesn't immediately clench in protest so he considers that a win.

Belle's still watching him though, so he smiles wanly and takes another spoonful. Because he's hungry, of course. "Quite good," he lies. When her face lights up he lets out a breath and scowls down at his hands. Quite good? The meal is wretched, as are most of the meals she provides for him, and she is his caretaker and he is her master and he ought to – but then he looks at her smiling face and merely reaches for his tea.

Tea is safe. Belle rarely manages to muck up the tea. 

The taste of the chamomile washes the slime away from his tongue, and Rumplestiltskin settles back in his chair, waves a hand at the rest of the dishes on the table. "And this?"

"Oh, it's… it's the time of the midwinter festival," she explains. "In Avonlea. I realize you don't celebrate it here, but—"

He raises his hand in a flourish. "A feast, then!"

"As much as I could," Belle says, ducking her head. "I'm still learning. I realize that I'm not the best cook, but the pastries turned out almost exactly as Rosalind used to make them back home."

Rumplestiltskin lets his hand drop, visions of filling the table with oysters and roasts of loin and ox-blood soup fading in the face of Belle's eagerness to please. He glances at the pastries in question – which remind him of nothing less than the horse droppings that line the roads – and swallows dryly. "I'm sure they're… quite delicious," he says, and when she beams at him he continues quickly before she can reach out and force one into his hand. He takes up his teacup again as an added line of defense, leans back in his chair. "Tell me more about the festival."

"Oh, it's lovely," she says, her eyes shining in remembrance as she perches her hip on the table. "We call it Winterfest. The entire castle is decorated with fir boughs and ribbons, and musicians come from all across the realm to perform. There are market stalls filled with wonderful items to buy. And the snow! It's always so light and fluffy at Winterfest, as though the gods look down and smile on us. Children skate on the pond, but what I enjoyed the most was just walking through the drifts. Feeling the snow on my face. It was peaceful. Everything seemed possible after that."

Rumplestiltskin frowns down into his cup. He vaguely remembers a similar festival in his village. Nothing so elaborate as travelling musicians, but someone would pull out a fiddle and there was a wooden platform erected in the square for dancers; long tables selling hot cider for the children and mead for their parents. He remembers Bae dashing between the tables, face flushed with cold, dodging snow balls, his high-pitched laughter filling the air. He remembers sitting on the sidelines clutching his walking stick and watching Milah moving through dance after dance with a myriad of partners, her face flushed for another reason entirely.

He twitches when Belle places something on the table next to his bowl of stew, reaches out one finger to poke at it and raises his eyes to hers. 

"It's also customary to give a gift at Winterfest," she says. Her gaze drops to her folded hands while her teeth poke at her bottom lip. "To someone we… care about."

Rumplestiltskin blinks, turns his attention back to the tiny straw doll. The execution is clumsy, somewhat amateurish, but he lifts it carefully; draws his finger slowly over the misshapen arms and legs, and recognizes the neatly tied bow as a scrap from one of Belle's other seldom-worn dresses. The doll lists to the left when he props it cautiously on the table, and it would look comical were it not the most remarkable gift he has ever received.

His mouth is dry, and he licks his lips nervously when he lifts his eyes. He means to speak commandingly but his voice emerges as barely a whisper. "For me?"

"I know it's not much, but there's little here for me to use but straw," she says quickly, "and I'm not very skilled—"

"Belle, it is… beyond measure," he says haltingly. He lifts a hand to indicate the plates of food, the sparkling room, the ridiculous unsightly perfect gift. "I have nothing for you," he continues weakly, and only when the words are out of his mouth and floating on the air does he realize the implications. He reaches to take them back, to pull them inside where they belong, but Belle is already smiling softly.

"Don't be silly," she says. "You freed my people from the ogres and brought peace back to our lands. You gifted me with an entire library of books, more than I could read in several lifetimes. You treat me with kindness," she continues, cocking her head, her eyes sparkling impishly, "or… at least you do now, once you realized you didn't have to spend every waking moment attempting to awe and frighten me with your power." Her hand comes to rest on his arm, her fingers warm through the silk. "You've given me a home here, Rumple, when I expected a cage."

Rumplestiltskin is frozen, staring blindly at the table top and rendered breathless and powerless by her, this tiny slip of a girl. And when he is finally able to think again, it is only to realize that his heart is pounding ferociously in his chest, the old shrivelled organ struggling valiantly to life. He shakes his head decisively, brushes her fingers from his arm to scrape his chair back from the table.

"Come," he says.

Belle jumps back, her brow knit in confusion. "But," she starts, "your dinner—"

"Quickly now, dearie," he calls over his shoulder, and hears her hasten to follow him into the foyer. Her soft 'oh' tells him that she's noticed her change of attire, and he turns in time to see her brushing a hand over her cloak and wiggling her toes in her new boots. She looks up at him, wide-eyed, and he waves a hand airily. "Lined with my finest wool," he says. 

"They're lovely and warm," Belle says agreeably. But her forehead remains wrinkled in confusion until he sweeps the door open ahead of them, watching her as her expression changes to one of doe-eyed wonder and delight.

Gone is the bitter wind, the driving sleet and ice pellets that have buffeted the castle for a fortnight. In its place are drifts of softly fallen snow, icicles glittering from the branches of the trees and shining under a bright winter sun. 

"Oh, it's lovely!" Belle breathes out, stepping past him to twirl on the path with her arms wide. She tilts her head to feel the flakes land gently on her cheeks, and when she turns back to him she simply glows. Rumplestiltskin can admit, if only to himself, that he has never seen anyone so beautiful. Not even Milah on their wedding night comes close to this vision. Only his first sight of his boy rivals the sight of Belle with snow coating the hood of her cloak and her eyes shining for him.

For him.

"Come with me, Rumple!" she calls gaily before leaving the path and plunging into the knee-high drifts, and he can do nothing but follow in her wake.

For a time he merely walks beside her, and if he uses a little magic to make sure that she doesn't struggle as she trots happily through the snow, then what of it? The last thing he needs is a maid with a broken ankle. He can only too easily imagine her refusing to let him heal her and instead propping herself in front of the fire with a book in her greedy fingers for six long weeks. An easy excuse to get out of cleaning his castle, that. Not that she does much cleaning, but that's neither here nor there.

She keeps up a steady chatter as she walks, and he inclines his head when she glances at him and lets the words wash over him while their meaning does not. It is enough to hear the music of her voice, to see the way her smile transforms her face so that she beams with her own kind of magic.

"… and Margaret slid all the way to the bottom, screaming the whole way," Belle finishes with an undignified snigger. 

"Hmm."

Rumplestiltskin stops when she does, watches as she narrows her eyes at him and props her hands on her hips. "Rumplestiltskin, are you listening to me at all?"

He lifts a palm to his chest, affects an incredulous air. "Of course."

She purses her lips and wanders away from him, stooping to run her fingers through the soft drifts. "At any rate," she calls over her shoulder, "this is a lovely gift. Thank you, Rumplestiltskin. I do so love the snow!" 

"Well," he says, pointing a finger at her, "you were never the one who had to shovel it, were you?"

She straightens and turns back to him, tucks her hands into the folds of her cloak and schools her features into solemnity. "True," she replies. "And I do owe a word of thanks to our groundskeepers for keeping the paths clear during the winter."

"Indeed."

"I was simply too busy doing _this_!" she sings out, pulling her hand from beneath her cloak and whipping it forward. 

Rumplestiltskin barely has time to blink before the snowball has hit him in the middle of his chest. He looks down at the smear of snow on the front of his formerly pristine cloak and then raises his head oh so slowly to take in his little maid. For her part, Belle stands still and quiet, her head cocked and her bottom lip caught between her perfect teeth.

Then she giggles and takes off at a run.

He could use his magic to catch her, conjure a hundred snowballs with which to deluge her in retribution. Instead, Rumplestiltskin lurches after her, stopping only to scoop up some of the fresh snow to meld his own snowball. He cannot contain his high-pitched twitter of glee when his aim is true, and she squeals and laughs when his throw strikes the small of her back. She darts a quick look at him over her shoulder before she ducks behind a tree, and her next missile is far wide of the mark. He strides forward quickly to round on her defensive position… and then perhaps he does use a _little_ magic when he returns fire, a simple instinctive twitch of his finger that allows the snowball to ease around an errant low-hanging branch and strike her in the chest.

"You're cheating!" she calls out.

"I _am_ the Dark One," he replies. 

She gives quite an unladylike snort before she dashes away from her position, and the chase is on.

He loses track of how many times he is struck, slipping and sliding on the fresh snow as they scramble through the grounds, her laughter ringing out and joining with his. It is the snowball that strikes him full in the face that is the last straw, however. He gulps and coughs, and before he's even aware that he's doing it he has called on his magic to bring him to her, appearing quietly behind Belle where she crouches behind a row of squat bushes, her pile of snowballs at her feet. He waits silently, barely breathing, and imagines the look of consternation on her face as she seeks for him in the snow-covered fields. Seeks, and does not find.

Finally she stands, one hand grasping at the thorny branches to pull herself to her feet, and it is only when she turns and gasps to see him standing so close that he flicks out with his magic to toss the hood from her head and dump the snow down the back of her neck.

Belle squeals, shivering and laughing and beautiful.

"Not so amusing now, is it dearie?" he croons.

"You!" she splutters, reaching out to push at his chest. She is laughing still, despite the cold snow seeping down her spine, and then her feet slip beneath her and she loses her footing and he sees the moment when her face morphs from pleasure into worry as she begins to topple. He reaches out quickly to snag her elbows and pull her upright, heaves her forward against him until her palms rest against his chest.

Had he thought his desiccated heart had renewed its stuttering beat? It has stopped now, as she takes in the wonder of her. Her curls have slipped free of her braid and her hair hangs straggling and loose at her cheeks, curling against the slim pale column of her neck. Her cheeks are flushed with – perhaps? – more than the cold, and her blue eyes stare up at him guilelessly.

He lifts a hand slowly, smoothes her hair back from her face.

He hears the quick intake of her breath, feels the stutter of it against his skin when she breathes out softly. Her teeth catch at her lower lip, and he wants nothing more than to close the distance between them and soothe the bite, stroke his tongue between her lips and--

"Rumple?" she breathes out.

Magic. He snatches at it greedily, transports them to the great room and sets the fire blazing with a single, simple thought. Another sends their cloaks and her boots back to the ether, leaves them snug in dry clothes.

"Enough of that, now," he announces, his voice loud in the stifling room. He realizes he's still holding her by the elbows, her body soft and pliant against his, and he quickly releases her arms, tries not to notice the way she stumbles away from him and blinks suddenly in the dim light. "Playtime is over, dearie, Winterfest or no. I believe you were supposed to clean the suits of armour today, yes?"

She blinks again, one hand smoothing down the front of her dress before lifting to catch at her tightly bound braid. "Yes?" she answers hesitantly.

Her face is still flushed, her eyes still meeting his fearlessly. He licks his suddenly dry lips, flourishes a hand in her direction. "Off you go, then," he commands. Tries to command, rather, around a throat that doesn't seem to want to work properly and a voice that sounds far too strident to his ears. "Those suits aren't going to polish themselves!"

"Yes, Rumplestiltskin," she says.

But Belle makes no move to walk away, and the corners of her lips have curled up softly, and she's still _looking_ at him, and Rumplestiltskin frowns and draws his magic around himself and takes himself to his tower in the space of one fractured heartbeat to the next. Takes himself to his potions and schemes, to the things that make sense. 

He presses his palms to his worktable and takes a deep breath and tries to calm his stuttering heart.

He is a monster but more than that, he is a fool. The girl can feel nothing for him, nothing but gratitude that he no longer locks her in the dungeon or that he chooses not to transform her into a flimsy pair of gloves when she displeases him. Appreciation for giving her a moment of happiness today, in the midst of a long and lonely life without her beloved Gaston. That is all.

He feels steadier when he lifts himself from the table, his movements quick and precise as he seeks out the ingredients for the potion he must make for his deal with the Gastonbury knight. He has much work to do, and no time to dally with the help! Still… he hesitates but a moment before sending out a tendril of magic, and nods in satisfaction when the malformed straw doll appears amongst his vials and beakers. 

But his hands are clumsy, crystals spilling onto the scarred table until he cocks his head, reaches out with his senses to find Belle. He hears the click of her heels on the stone and the faint whisk of her cloth on the armour; smells the sour sulphur-like odour of the silver polish. And after a long moment, he hears her begin to hum. 

Rumplestiltskin nods again and keeps the connection open. It is a pleasant tune, after all, no matter how much her braying voice mangles it.

After a while, Rumplestiltskin begins to hum.


End file.
